Dispensationalism: 4 Consequences of This Bad Theology (Part 3)
Dispensationalism, though a modern theological framework, has significantly shaped Christian thought and culture, often to the Church’s detriment. This third article explores its practical consequences, including undermining biblical authority, fostering fear and anxiety, and promoting harmful dualism. By examining these impacts, we’ll see how dispensationalism has distorted theology and weakened the Church’s mission, and why a return to covenantal thinking offers a hopeful and faithful alternative.
This is the third article of our series on dispensationalism. In parts one and two, I discussed the history and theology of dispensationalism and critiqued its views from a biblical and theological standpoint. I encourage you to read those before continuing with this article.
Here, I’ll discuss the downstream consequences of the faulty theology of dispensationalism and the damage it has caused for the church and our broader culture. The consequences of dispensationalism range in severity: from death and destruction due to wars, to environmental and political challenges, to American Christians being afflicted with really bad Christian movies starring Nicolas Cage.
1. Dispensationalism Undermines the Word of God
As discussed in the previous articles, unlike the unified story of redemption of covenant theology that the Bible teaches, dispensationalism makes a hard distinction between the Old Testament and the New Testament. This movement led to bad teaching in a lot of areas in Christianity. Christians were taught by pastors that, functionally, the Old Testament did not matter, and what matters instead is when “Jesus shows up” in the New Testament. God in the Old Testament was increasingly viewed as judgmental, distant, and violent, in contrast to Jesus' gentle and loving demeanor.
Theological liberals and pagans, whether they realize it or not, take this idea and run with it when they dismiss the moral imperatives of the Old Testament. This is predominantly seen when people argue that, since Jesus doesn’t say that homosexuality is a sin, Old Testament prohibitions against homosexuality are “outdated.” Andy Stanley famously articulated this strong break from the Old Testament when he stated that the Christian faith must be “unhitched” from the Old Testament, and further stated that the Old Testament should not be seen as “the go-to source regarding any behavior in the church” [1].
Anxiety and fear should not characterize the Christian life … the Second Coming of Christ should not provoke fear in Christians, but only profound hope.
While dispensationalism undermines the Word of God, our historic, Reformed Christian faith has a high view of all of the Holy Scriptures. Question 3 in the Westminster Larger Catechism states that “the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are the Word of God, the only rule for faith and obedience.” And Question 5 further states that “the Scriptures principally teach what man is to believe concerning God, and what duty God requires of man.” Christians are to look to the entirety of the Bible to know what they are to believe about God and how to live according to his ways.
2. Dispensationalism’s Futuristic Worldview Cultivates Fear in Christians
It is incredibly common for the average American Evangelical who grew up influenced by dispensational thinking—particularly regarding the end times—to live their life filled with fear and anxiety. It varies depending on the temperament of the individual, but this anxiety manifests commonly in the form of hyperfixation on current events, trying to see if each new conflict in the world is a “rumors of wars” preceding the rise of the Antichrist, speculation over what new political figure might be said Antichrist, and suspicion that new technologies might be the Mark of the Beast and that globalists are trying to initiate a world government.
Other Christians may be less concerned about evil in the world and instead are more concerned—and anxious over—the timing of the Rapture and Christ’s Second Coming. They worry about whether they will meet certain life milestones in time, or worse, if they’ll be left behind when the Rapture comes. The dispensationalists believe that only “true” Christians, or the invisible church, will be Raptured at Christ’s “secret” coming. As many dispensationalists do not believe that God securely keeps those whom he saves (commonly called the Perseverance of the Saints), this cultivates a lot of uncertainty about whether or not you are actually saved and will be raptured.
Dispensationalists do not believe the Church will go through their idea of the Tribulation. Instead, they create a new category of “Tribulation Saints” who miss out on the Rapture, put their faith in Christ after the Rapture, and have to endure the Tribulation and persecution of the “Antichrist” because of it [2]. 1970s dispensationalist fanfiction portrayed this persecution as death by beheading via guillotines for refusing a barcode on their forehead or right hand [3]. The hugely popular Left Behind series of books and films continued to promote these awful tropes at the turn of the millennium as scare tactics for evangelism. The central message was that you needed to ensure that you were right with Jesus so you weren’t left behind when the rapture would take place (any time now).
Anxiety and fear should not characterize the Christian life. Matthew 6:34 and Philippians 4:6-7 clearly teach that Christians should not be anxious. 2 Timothy 1:7 positively states that God gives Christians “a spirit not of fear but of power and love and self-control.” Additionally, the Second Coming of Christ should not provoke fear in Christians, but only profound hope. Titus 2:3 speaks of this blessed hope, of a wonderful day when Christ will return. The misplaced fear of dispensationalism is a cancer within the Church.
3. Dispensationalism Undermines the Sufficiency of Christ
Dispensationalism wrongly teaches against a unified view of God’s redemptive plan, instead teaching that God had a different plan for salvation for each “dispensation,” or church age, of human history. Of particular relevance today are the Mosaic dispensation and the Ecclesial dispensation. Dispensationalists believe that under the old Mosaic Law, the Israelites were saved by their obedience to the Law. They further believe that when the first-century Jews rejected Christ as their Messiah, God moved on and began a new work with the Gentiles. As this was a new dispensation, the dispensationalists no longer believed the Mosaic Law applied to Christians, who were now under the law of Christ.
This distinction—believing that the Jews are saved by the Mosaic Law and Christians by the grace of Christ—is then combined with the dispensational view that the prophetic promises to the Jews are yet to be fulfilled until a future millennial reign of Christ, leading to further theological problems regarding the nature of salvation.
A prominent dispensational teacher, John Hagee, famously rejects the need for Jews to be converted to Christ, believing that God has a separate plan of salvation for them. Additionally, dispensational groups have raised funds and actively supported causes to rebuild a third temple in Jerusalem and reinstitute the Jewish sacrificial system, which were both destroyed within a generation of Christ’s first coming. Dispensationalists believe that the Jewish sacrifices will resume and be a major part of the future Messianic kingdom, in contrast to the clear teachings in the book of Hebrews that Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross was once and for all.
Related to this is another false notion: that of Lordship salvation, or “easy-believism.” An idea emerged that a Christian could have faith in Christ and accept Christ as their “Savior,” and yet not follow Christ as “Lord.” This idea of “free grace” led to many dispensationalists believing that if they simply prayed a prayer, professing faith in Christ at some point in their life, they would be secure in their salvation, not having to repent of sin. This false teaching leads to many supposed “Christians” who merely had false conversions, as the Scriptures teach that true faith always leads to repentance (Acts 2:38).
The false doctrine of Dispensationalism does not understand the relationship between the Law and the Gospel, or faith and works. The artificial dispensational division of the Old and New Covenants ultimately undermines the sufficiency of Christ. Instead, covenant theology rightly teaches that God has a unified plan of salvation. During the Mosaic covenant, God’s covenant people looked forward to the sacrifice of Christ, performing animal sacrifices foreshadowing what Jesus would ultimately accomplish. In the new covenant inaugurated by Christ, Christians look backward in thankfulness to what Christ accomplished once and for all for their salvation. The Scriptures clearly teach that salvation is found through faith alone, in Christ alone.
4. Dispensationalism Promotes Dualist Doctrine in the Church
Dualism is an unbiblical concept that dissociates earthly or physical things from heavenly or spiritual things. The Bible teaches that both the spiritual and material realms serve as the temple of the Lord, which is why Jesus taught his disciples in Matthew 6 to pray for our Father’s kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven. Dualist thinking in the Church rejects this integrative doctrine, devaluing the material and insisting that really only the immaterial is what matters. Thus the physical world is considered insignificant and fleeting, such that the Christian’s interaction with the world is minimized and even demonized.
Dispensationalists believe that all of the prophetic promises of the Old Testament that have physical dimensions (including the reign of Christ over the earth) have nothing to do with the Church, but are solely for the nation of Israel. The reign of Christ is limited to occur in a future 1,000-year earthly reign when Christ will be the Messianic king of the Jews. As these physical promises have nothing to do with the Church, Christians who hold to these beliefs compartmentalize their understanding of God’s kingdom and the Gospel to being solely about individual salvation.
Dispensationalism taught Christians to sit on their hands and wait for Christ to return in five minutes … instead of faithfully building Christian institutions that would impact the world for 500 years or longer.
This manifests through extreme pietism where Christians withdraw from their interaction with the world. Christians caught in this dispensational dualism only interact with the world through evangelism, as they are solely concerned with individual salvation. This dualism discourages the building of institutions and the engaging and transforming of culture. As these evangelicals withdrew from the world, they stopped fighting for Christian causes, as they viewed the world as going to hell in a handbasket.
As Christians withdrew from culture and politics, progressivism, secularism, and the sexual revolution took hold, increasingly pushing Christianity to the margins of society. The only political cause that dispensationalists would get behind involved Zionism, and supporting the modern nation of Israel, due to their wrong prophetic beliefs about the importance of the modern nation of Israel in relation to their understanding of the End Times. Dispensationalism stopped Christians from caring about stewarding natural resources and the environment, as they believed the end was nigh. In dispensational circles, saving for retirement was frowned upon in favor of giving more money to missions, and many Christians would not have or postpone having children, either to go overseas for missions, or sadly out of fear of their future children experiencing the horrors of the Tribulation.
This dualistic thinking, and its pessimistic view of the world, is a destructive lie. The Bible teaches a holistic view of the world, where Christ is reigning as King over heaven and earth now, and Christians are to follow the instructions of Christ in Matthew 16 and 28, faithfully stewarding the earth and advancing his kingdom until Christ returns.
Conclusion
As detailed above, the bad theology of Dispensationalism leads to a host of practical problems, both individual and systemic. The cumulative effects of Dispensationalism in the 20th century certainly contributed to the collapse of Christendom in Western Civilization, as faithful Christians who were misled by the false teachings of Dispensationalism withdrew from their important work building Christ’s kingdom and transforming the world with the power of the Gospel.
Instead of raising children to change the world, Christians deceived by Dispensationalism taught their children to fear the world and its influence, and to retreat instead. Dispensationalism taught Christians to sit on their hands and wait for Christ to return in five minutes … instead of faithfully building Christian institutions that would impact the world for 500 years or longer. It is time for Christians to reject the error of Dispensationalism and the cancer of fear and pessimism that come with it, instead clinging to the truth of God’s faithful covenant with his people and his good plans for the world. Instead of living in fear of the End Times and Christ’s Second Coming, Christians are to build Christ’s kingdom with laughter and joy, with complete assurance of the Church’s eventual victory over darkness and evil, for Christ himself promised this victory saying: “I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it” (Matthew 16:18 ESV).
End Notes:
R. Albert Mohler, “Getting ‘Unhitched’ from the Old Testament? Andy Stanley Aims at Heresy,” AlbertMohler.Com, accessed December 3, 2024, https://albertmohler.com/2018/08/10/getting-unhitched-old-testament-andy-stanley-aims-heresy/.
Comically called the “Tribulation Force” by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins in their fictional Left Behind franchise.
If interested in watching, check out the A Thief in the Night film series.
